The Whale

According to the local news coverage, it all began
on Sunday, December 11, 2005, when a fisherman spotted
a 50-ton humpback whale tangled up in crab trap lines
off the Marin County coast in northern California.

His call for help was answered by the Marin Marine Mammal
Center, which dispatched a group of Coast Guard divers
and whale experts to the site near the Farallon Islands
to free the animal.

The rescue operation was both difficult and dangerous.
Crew members found the whale entwined in some 20 ropes,
each 240 feet long and wrapped so tight they were slicing
into its flesh.

The lines had to be cut by hand, which required diving
perilously close to the whale and its powerful tail.
It took about an hour, and no one was injured.

All of the divers remarked on the whale's "affectionate"
behavior. One said the creature watched and seemed to
wink at him as he was cutting a line that went through
its mouth.

Once freed, the whale began circling and approached the
divers one by one to "nuzzle" them.

"You hate to anthropomorphize too much," Mick Menigoz
told the San Francisco Chronicle, "but the whale was
doing little dives and the guys were rubbing shoulders
with it.

I don't know for sure what it was thinking, but it's
something that I will always remember. It was just
too cool."

May you, and all those you love,
be so blessed and fortunate ...

to be surrounded by people
who will help you get untangled
from the things that are binding you.

And, may you always know the joy
of giving and receiving gratitude.

Comments: True story not just another "Urban Legend".

Sources and further reading:

Daring Rescue of Whale off Farallones
SF Chronicle, 14 December 2005
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/12/14/MNGNKG7Q0V1.DTL

Whale of a Rescue off Marin Coast
KTVU-TV News, 14 December 2005
http://www.ktvu.com/news/5525793/detail.html

Scuba Divers Rescue Humpback Whale Near Farallon Islands
Cyber Diver News Network, 13 December 2005
http://www.cdnn.info/news/eco/e051213.html